The report provides evidence that rising land prices has forced the urban poor out of inner-city informal musseques to occupy lower-valued environmentally risky sites such as river basins, dangerous slopes and areas susceptible to flooding on the margins of cities like Luanda. The urban areas of Luanda (the capital city of Angola), Huambo (the capital of Huambo Province), and Cachiungo (the main town in the District of Cachiungo in Huambo Province) were chosen for this study as they are dissimilar and were considered to be representative of different types of urban areas in Angola.
Development Workshop carried out the research project from 2009 to 2011 to examine the differences in the three urban areas. The study used field research and new mapping techniques to supply baseline data on the five indicators which the United Nations uses to define slums for the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and, secondly, to explore in more depth the spatial aspects of poverty and urban environmental issues in Luanda.
A typology of settlement types was developed for each urban area, based on the date of settlement, history, the distance from the city centre, service levels, street patterns and type of housing. In Luanda, the largest urban area, there is a greater diversity of settlement types, hence nine settlement types were identified. In Huambo, only three settlement types were identified: the formally-urbanised centre of the city, the informally-settled areas surrounding it, and semi-formal settlements which have some, but not all, of the services associated with formal housing areas. In Cachiungo, only two settlement types were identified (the formally-urbanised centre of the city and the informally-settled areas surrounding it) but in practice it was found that the characteristics of the two were similar.
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Rooftop mapping was made of all residential units and built structures in Luanda: